The Snowman Surprise

  Contents

  Chapter 1: The Winter Festival

  Chapter 2: A Chocolate Disaster

  Chapter 3: Trouble on Tape

  Chapter 4: The Bunny Clue

  Chapter 5: More Competition

  Chapter 6: The Disappearing Ducks

  Chapter 7: The Crowning Touch

  Chapter 8: The Thief Is Found

  1

  The Winter Festival

  I think we should make a giant snow bunny,” said eight-year-old Nancy Drew. She skipped along the sidewalk and kicked up a powdery cloud of snow.

  “I think we should make a giant snow princess,” said her best friend Bess Marvin. She made an outline of a big, puffy princess dress in the air.

  “I think we should make a giant snow monster,” George Fayne piped up. George was Bess’s cousin and Nancy’s other best friend. She bared her teeth like a scary monster.

  “I think you girls should make a bunny, a princess, and a monster,” Hannah Gruen suggested with a twinkle in her eye. “It would be like a scene from a movie. The snow princess could save the snow bunny from the snow monster!”

  Nancy, Bess, and George giggled. Hannah always had fun ideas. Hannah was the Drew family’s housekeeper. But she had also helped take care of Nancy since she was three years old, after Mrs. Drew died.

  Hannah was walking with Nancy and her friends to the neighborhood park. There was going to be a big winter festival there on Sunday. Part of the festival was a snow-sculpture contest for kids. Nancy, George, and Bess wanted to enter the contest as a team, and the applications were due today.

  When the girls reached the park, Nancy thought it looked beautiful all covered with snow. The trees were covered with snow. The benches were covered with snow. Even the swing sets were covered with snow. Nancy liked the way the snow crunched under their feet and the way the cold air made their cheeks tingle. She loved winter! She especially loved winter vacation, when they could just play and not have to go to school.

  The park was crowded with grown-ups and kids. Some of them were sledding or skiing on cross-country skis. Others were building snowmen and snowwomen.

  “Look!” Bess said.

  She pointed to a cluster of booths in one corner of the park. A sign over one of the booths said: WELCOME TO THE FIFTH ANNUAL RIVER HEIGHTS WINTER FESTIVAL.

  They all headed in the direction of the booths. As they got closer, Nancy noticed a sign that said: SIGN UP HERE FOR THE SNOW-SCULPTURE CONTEST.

  “That’s us!” Nancy cried out. “Let’s go!”

  The girls ran toward the booth.

  There was a young guy standing behind it. He was dressed in a silver parka with a furry collar. His long, curly red hair was tucked under an orange wool cap.

  “Hey, snow artists,” the guy said with a smile. “You look like you’re ready to make some snow sculptures.”

  “Definitely!” George said eagerly.

  “Well, you’ve come to the right place. My name is Mad Mike. Let me give you some application forms, and we can get you started,” he said.

  “George and Bess and I are going to be a team,” Nancy explained.

  “Great idea! That means you only have to fill out one form. Have you decided what kind of sculpture you’re going to make yet?” Mad Mike asked.

  “A bunny!” Nancy said.

  “A princess!” Bess said at the same time.

  “A monster!” George chimed in.

  “Whoa, a bunny-princess-monster. Sounds like a super sculpture,” Mad Mike joked. “I can see it now. A fire-breathing girl with big, floppy white ears.”

  Nancy and her friends cracked up. “No, we’re going to make just one of those,” Nancy corrected him.

  “Or we might make something else,” George added.

  “Well, whatever you end up making will be awesome,” Mad Mike said. He handed them a form. “Just fill out this application and return it to me. You can pick a spot and get started with your sculpture whenever you want. You can work on it anytime between now and Sunday. You have to be done by Sunday at noon, and the judging starts right at one.”

  Hannah took the application form from him. “I’ll take care of that. Are there any other rules the girls should know about?”

  “Hmm, rules. Yes. Absolutely no touching or tampering with other people’s snow sculptures. You can use any materials you want for your snow sculpture, as long as they’re not harmful to trees, grass, birds, animals, or people. And you have to be eight to enter this contest,” Mad Mike said with a grin. “You girls look like you’re what—twenty? Twenty-five? You should be fine.”

  Nancy and her friends cracked up again. Mad Mike not only had a funny nickname—he was funny too!

  “Thanks, Mad Mike,” Nancy said.

  She and the others bid Mad Mike goodbye. Hannah went over to an empty booth to fill out the application form.

  Nancy, Bess, and George waited nearby. They watched some kids who had already started their sculptures. Nancy recognized a couple of fourth- and fifth-graders from their school, Carl Sandburg Elementary School.

  Nancy and her friends were in the third grade. They didn’t see any other third graders from Carl Sandburg.

  George jumped up on a snow pile, then jumped off again. “Maybe we should do a sculpture of a soccer player,” she suggested. “It could be super-athletic-looking. She could be doing a header.” She pretended to knock a soccer ball in the air with her head.

  “How about a snow elephant?” Bess said. “We could give him a big, long trunk. Like this.” She put her arm up against her face and pretended to have an elephant trunk. She swung it back and forth. “Give me peanuts!” she said in a deep voice.

  Nancy liked the idea of the elephant. She also liked George’s idea of doing something super-athletic-looking.

  “I know,” she said suddenly. “How about a ballet dancer? Ballet dancers are super-athletic!”

  “Yes!” Bess cried out. “I love that idea! I love it even more than the elephant idea.”

  “Soccer players are more athletic than ballet dancers,” George pointed out.

  Nancy shook her head. “Ballet dancers have to jump way up in the air. They have to twirl around and around on their toes. They have to be really strong and flexible and graceful.”

  “Hmm, that’s true,” George agreed. “Okay, let’s do a ballet dancer!”

  “Yay!” Bess cried out. She spun around in the snow like a ballerina.

  “Now, all we have to do is decide what kind of ballet dancer,” Nancy pointed out.

  “How about the Mouse King from the Nutcracker?” George said. “He’s super-mean-looking. And he has three heads!”

  “Too weird,” Bess replied. “How about Aurora from Sleeping Beauty? We can make a snow sculpture of her sleeping!”

  “Hmm,” Nancy said. She liked the Sleeping Beauty ballet. She had seen it last year in Chicago with her father.

  Then Nancy thought of another ballet she really liked. In fact, she, George, and Bess had watched a video of it recently. “How about Swan Lake?” she suggested. “We could do a snow sculpture of Odette. Remember, she’s the swan princess who falls in love with the prince?”

  “Yes!” Bess said excitedly. “That’s a great idea, Nancy.”

  George nodded. “We could do a sculpture of Odette with some of her swans.”

  “Yay! We’re going to do a Swan Lake sculpture!” Nancy exclaimed.

  Just then, the girls were interrupted by an angry voice.

  “No, you aren’t. That’s my idea, and you stole it!”

  2

  A Chocolate Disaster

  Nancy turned around. Standing behind them was a girl about their age. She had long, wavy brown hair that came down to her waist. She was wearin
g a black velvet beret, a matching black coat, and black glasses with tiny rhinestones on them.

  With her was another girl who looked like her, but younger and with shorter hair. She was wearing a pink parka with fuzzy pink mittens.

  “Who are you?” Nancy asked the older girl.

  “I’m Denise, and you stole my idea,” the girl replied huffily.

  “What idea?” George asked her.

  “I came up with the idea to do a Swan Lake snow sculpture first,” Denise explained. “You girls stole it from me. I’m telling the director! You are going to get into such big, huge trouble!”

  She turned to go. “Come on, Tess,” she said to the younger girl.

  “Where are we going?” Tess asked her. “I’m hungry, and Mommy said we could have a snack!”

  Nancy realized that Tess must be Denise’s younger sister.

  “I’ll get you a snack in a minute. But first, we have to turn in these . . . these thieves,” Denise told Tess.

  Nancy couldn’t believe this was happening. “Wait a second,” she called out to Denise. “How could we steal your idea? We’ve never even met you before.”

  Denise hesitated. “Well, you could have been spying on me and listening to me talking about my idea,” she pointed out.

  “We didn’t spy on you. We came up with our Odette idea all by ourselves,” George said firmly.

  Tess tugged on Denise’s sleeve. “Odette! That’s different from what you’re doing, Didi,” she said.

  “Why? What are you doing?” Nancy asked Denise curiously.

  Denise shrugged. “I’m doing a snow sculpture of Von Rothbart and Odile.”

  Nancy grinned. She remembered Von Rothbart and Odile. Von Rothbart was the evil sorcerer in Swan Lake. In the story, Von Rothbart put a curse on Odette and other young women so they would turn into swans between sunrise and midnight every day. Odile was his black-swan daughter who tricked Odette’s true love, Prince Siegfried, into marrying her.

  “That’s totally different from what we’re doing,” Nancy told Denise. “You’re doing Von Rothbart and Odile, and we’re doing Odette and her swans.”

  “Yeah! There’s no reason there can’t be two Swan Lake sculptures in the contest, as long as they’re different,” George agreed.

  Denise looked thoughtful. “Well, I guess,” she grumbled.

  Tess tugged on Denise’s sleeve again. “Can I help you with your sculpture, Didi?” she begged.

  “No, Tess, you’re too little,” Denise replied. She smiled coolly at Nancy and her friends. “Yeah, go ahead and do your Swan Lake sculpture. It doesn’t matter, anyway, since I’m going to win first place!”

  Denise sounds pretty sure of herself Nancy thought.

  But she, George, and Bess would show her!

  • • •

  On Thursday morning, Nancy, George, and Bess arrived at the park bright and early. There had been a big snowstorm the night before, so the park was covered with a fresh blanket of thick, white snow.

  Bess scooped up a handful of snow and patted it into a snowball. “Look out!” she cried. She aimed the snowball at George.

  “Don’t you dare!” George giggled.

  Nancy scooped up some snow too, and joined in the fun. The girls ran around, laughing and kicking snow and throwing snowballs at each other’s feet.

  Nancy stopped after a few minutes, out of breath. “Safety!” she called out.

  “Me too,” Bess agreed. “We should start working on our snow sculpture.”

  “That Denise girl is here,” George said, pointing. “I guess she’s doing her sculpture all by herself. She’s not part of a team, like us.”

  Nancy looked where George was pointing. Denise was sitting on a bench, scribbling in a notebook. Her little sister, Tess, was sitting next to her.

  There were other people in the park sketching and working on their sculptures too. Nancy counted at least four teams of kids and six kids working alone. She knew from the contest rules that they were all between the ages of eight and twelve.

  “Now what?” Bess said.

  “Why don’t we make a sketch, like everybody else?” Nancy suggested. “It seems like a good idea. That way, we can plan exactly what our sculpture will look like.”

  “I have some drawing paper in my backpack,” Bess said.

  “And I have some cool markers,” George added.

  “Perfect!” Nancy said. “Let’s find a place to sit.”

  The three girls headed over to an empty bench. They cleared off the snow and Nancy sat down. Bess handed her a drawing pad, and Nancy got to work.

  They made one sketch, then another, then another. It took half a dozen tries before they got just the design they wanted.

  “This is it!” Nancy announced finally. She held up the sketch.

  Nancy had drawn most of it, with the other girls’ help. It showed a picture of the beautiful swan princess Odette. She was wearing a white tutu and a rhinestone crown. Her arms were in the air, like wings.

  Around her feet were six swans. They were looking up at her with their wings outstretched.

  “Awesome!” Bess announced.

  “Super awesome!” George agreed.

  “Let’s take a hot chocolate break,” Nancy suggested. “Then we can get started on our sculpture.”

  “That’ll be a lot of work. I think we’ll need hot chocolate and cupcakes,” Bess said.

  “Good point,” Nancy said with a grin.

  The three girls left their sketch and their backpacks on the bench and walked over to the snack stand. Hannah had given Nancy five dollars to buy snacks for all of them.

  “What can I get you girls?” asked the woman behind the counter. She had a friendly smile and lots of gray curls piled on top of her head.

  “Three hot chocolates with marshmallows, please, and three cupcakes,” Nancy said.

  “With lots of frosting on them!” Bess added.

  The woman chuckled. “You got it!”

  The woman made their snacks, and Nancy paid for them. Then the girls sat down at a picnic table under the covered roof and munched on their snacks. While they ate, they watched other kids making their sculptures.

  “That team over there looks like they’re making a giant snow helicopter,” George said, pointing.

  “Or maybe it’s a giant snow birthday cake,” Bess frowned. “It’s hard to tell.”

  “And look at that girl’s sculpture,” Nancy said, pointing to another pile of snow. “She’s making something really long and skinny.”

  “Maybe it’ll be a snow giraffe.” Bess giggled.

  As soon as they were done eating, they threw away their trash and returned to the bench where they had left their backpacks and sketch.

  Nancy noticed right away that something was very wrong.

  “Oh, no!” she cried out. “Look at our sketch!”

  Bess and George gasped. Someone had poured hot chocolate all over their drawing of Odette and the swans.

  The sketch was totally ruined!

  3

  Trouble on Tape

  Someone destroyed our beautiful sketch!” Bess exclaimed.

  “We worked so hard on it!” George said in an angry voice.

  Nancy tried to pick up the sketch very carefully. But it was a big, soggy mess. Hot chocolate and bunny-shaped marsh-mallow bits were everywhere, smearing and smudging the markings.

  Who could have done such an awful thing? Nancy wondered. Was it someone involved in the snow-sculpture contest?

  Just then Nancy got the feeling that they were being watched. She took a deep breath and glanced around.

  “Hi! Say cheese for the camera!”

  A tall, red-haired girl was standing there, holding a video camera. She was pointing it at Nancy and her friends.

  “Who are you?” Nancy asked her.

  “What are you doing?” George added.

  “Are you making a movie of us?” Bess piped up. She smoothed out her long blond hair and smiled right at the
camera.

  “I’m Joan,” the girl introduced herself. “I’m doing a videotape project of the winter festival for school. Looks like you spilled something,” she added, pointing to the soggy sketch.

  “We didn’t spill something. Someone else spilled something,” George retorted. “We left for a snack break and when we came back, we found the sketch like this!”

  “Who do you think did it?” Joan asked curiously. She moved toward the sketch for a close-up shot.

  Nancy frowned. “Um, I don’t know if you should be putting this in your movie.”

  “Oh, but it’s so exciting! People love crime!” Joan exclaimed.

  Crime? Nancy wasn’t sure about that. But in any case, Joan and her video camera made her kind of uncomfortable. She didn’t want the whole world to know about their messed-up sketch.

  Besides, Nancy realized that they needed to report what happened to the director right away.

  “We have to go. We need to talk to Mad Mike,” Nancy announced to Joan. She grabbed Bess and George’s hands. “Come on!”

  “But what about the movie?” Bess asked her.

  “Come on!” Nancy insisted.

  The girls found Mad Mike at a picnic table. He was eating a granola bar and looking over a pile of application forms.

  “Hey, girls!” Mad Mike greeted them. “What’s up? Not enough snow for you to work with?” he joked.

  “We have a problem,” Nancy said. Then she proceeded to tell him about the hot chocolate incident.

  Mad Mike’s smile turned into a frown. “Well. That’s not good at all.”

  “Can you find out who did it?” George asked him.

  “I’ll e-mail the parents and mention what happened,” Mad Mike said. “It’s possible someone spilled their hot chocolate by accident and is too embarrassed to say anything.”

  “That’s true,” Bess said, nodding. “It can be really embarrassing to admit you’re a klutz!”

  Nancy and the girls said good-bye to Mad Mike and returned to their spot. They spent the next hour redoing the sketch. Then they started working on the actual sculpture.

  By the end of the afternoon, they had sculpted three swans. Nancy had to admit that they looked really great.